http://www.georgiatimes.info/en/articles/54106.html
Georgia hosts the premiere staging of Giovanni Boccaccio's Decameron - a set of erotic short stories yet untackled by Georgian directors. Levan Tsuladze has given it a try, and the "human comedy" by the Italian writer of the Renaissance appears absolutely new in his interpretation. As the author says, this is a story about ways "the world goes mad".
The Decameron premiere in Kote Mardzhanishvili State Drama Theater aroused unheard-of interest of the public. Yesterday was the first night. "There were so many people inside that some had to stand in the aisles", - Lela Ochauri, a theater critic, told in an interview with GeorgiaTimes.
- Coming out after the performance, the foyer was packed and there was no room to walk freely. People's expectations were great. Mardzhanishvili Theater is always packed, particularly when Levan Tsuladze presents his works.
There was another reason for the full house - Decameron has never been staged in Georgia because of too immodest episodes. Some lucky men could see Tsuladze's production in autumn 2010 at a press show as part of Tbilisi International Theater Festival. The director's decision to postpone the official premiere of his interpretation is not incidental. The staging has undergone considerable changes over the past nine months.
- As far as I know, Tsuladze, has considered the staging thoroughly, - Ochauri underlines. - Basically, it is not typical of him. He is a kind of director that can produce an accomplished work in a couple of weeks or months. But this story is complicated. He had to write a play on the basis of it on his own. He had to arrange the performance dramatically, move the action onto the scene and bring it to life with the help of art plastique and visual art. I know it took him several weeks of solitary work to define each mise-en-scene. Certainly we hoped to see the result as soon as possible but he knew it would wrong to be in a hurry. This staging is much deeper than the level of emotions and first impressions. That was the reason of delay, I guess.
The result met all expectations. The exalted audience was applauding for a long time.
Boccaccio's short stories recently staged in Russia looked frivolous, joking and light. Georgian Decameron is entirely different from the original against this background, as well as Pier Paolo Pasolini's movie marked "under 16 not allowed". Italian stories interpreted by Tsuladze look quite chaste. Actors are decently clad, and their characters are not absorbed in love problems.
- There is nothing prohibited in the story. A common opinion is that Decameron is an erotic work that deals with young people telling about sexual adventures of others. Yet, the director focuses on relations between a personality and society, society and state, or personality and state. A society can misunderstand free people that can live the way they want or the way God lets them. But they are free from God. That is the backbone of the director's philosophy that helped him come through unscathed. He shows no openly sexual scenes. On the other hand, he doesn't seem interested in them", - our interlocutor believes.
Tsuladze himself expressed the idea of the performance in a slightly different light: it's about ways "the world goes mad". "I think the contemporary world is also moving to a collapse of insanity", - the director explained. By the way, the performance begins with the declaration of war immediately catching attention of the viewer.
- I was astounded at how he combines the Renaissance layer and an absolutely modern interpretation. But he does deserve praise for the fragments he took out of the original and the way he assembled them into a weird, unconventional sequence", - Lela Ochauri remarks.
In addition to the philosophical opening scene, Decameron in Mardzhanishvili Theater is beautiful from the esthetical point of view. "Levan Tsuladze acts as both an artist and a scene-designer. This synthesis is his achievement as well", - our interlocutor adds. Though it would be unfair not to mention other people that contributed to this staging: Giya Margania, the choreographer, Shota Skhirtladze, the stunt director, Vakhtang Kakhidze, the composer. The following actors take part in the show: Malhaz Abuladze, Beso Baratashvili, Marlen Egutia, Kakha Abuashvili, Irma Berianidze, David Hurtsilava, Eka Chkheidze, Manana Kazakova, Zurab Berikashvili.
The next two days will be Decameron's premiere nights supposed to be attended by foreign guests invited by the administration. Further reviews will show whether they will also appreciate the show like Georgia's beau monde did.
Svetlana Bolotnikova